Copyright (c) 2000
Santiago Romero Iglesias [email protected]
With great contributions from Alvaro Alea Fernandez [email protected]
(128K and Gunstick support, different machine types, and many other features)
ASpectrum Emulator: This is our contribution to the Spectrum World. I just wanted to see if I was able to write an Spectrum emulator written in pure C, as a simple proof-of-concept, and for fun.
By the moment, just run it without arguments to run the 48K spectrum ROM, or give it a filename to load snapshots or tape files...
./aspectrum file.sna (or .sp, or .tap, .tzx or .z80).
Remember that loading of .tap files requieres a LOAD "" in the BASIC interpreter of the emulator. The LOAD command is put by pressing the 'J' key, and the " by pressing ALT+P (like in the real Spectrum).
Also even the .tzx files are supported any kind of custom or turbo loading squeme is not supporting and don't work by now.
For a resume of aspectrum command line args use "./aspectrum --help"
You'll need Allegro 5.x to run this program. The font.* files MUST be located at the same directory where you run the aspectrum binary, or in /usr/share/aspectrum
spectrum.rom and other .rom files MUST be in the same directory, in /usr/share/aspectrum or specified the ROM file by command line args.
You can also specific a dump of a Interface 2 Cardtrige.
To use Gunstick Emulation you must have a working mouse and call the emulator with "./aspectrum -j G" (CASE SENSITIVE), or activate the gunstick emulation in General Options menu (F7).
One time you start the gunstick emulation can avoid the "888"s locating the mouse in the border of the screen. You can emulate several version of Spectrum using de -m param, but the snapshots feature is only full functional on 48K. see the help message to more information about what versions are avalible.
NOTE THAT THIS EMULATOR IT'S NOT USER-FRIENDLY AS IT'S STILL IN FULL DEVELOPMENT STAGE.
To compile the debug version you'll need to install MSS (Memory Supervision System) that generates .log files reporting memory management (pointer errors, allocations, etc.).
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Currently it emulates several of the Sinclair/Investronica/Amstrad spectrums, at least for memory and z80 (no disk or 128K Sound) until I fix all the wrong Z80 opcodes (bugs, bugs, bugs :) and until all the undocumented opcodes are implemented. Then I'll add support for other features.
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There are not implemented opcodes (although almost all games work, so they are not used very often) and at least one bug in the Z80 emulation that makes some games to fail (see WORKING file).
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The emulator has a built-in debugger (very simple) that I use to search bugs (I usually comparte the output of my emulation with the real spectrum or another emulators).
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It can load and save .SNA, .SP and .Z80 snapshot files.
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It can load .TAP and .TZX files at "zero" speed (I've still not implemented the real-time loading routines), by using LOAD "" on the emulator. It still does not load protected games nor games launched by non-standard loaders. LOAD "" is writen pressing J and ALT+P and ALT+P.
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I've tested the emulator with more than 100 games, and almost all were working right. If you found a game that don't work or refuse to load, and if you think that it not use any of the unsupported features, please, fell free to send it to the autors, to examine it.
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All the coding style, documentation, etc. sucks :).
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
(...Read the file License on the emulator package...)
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Marat Fayzullin, Raul Glez, Philip Kendall and Ignacio Burguer: These people helped me a lot with the emulator: he explained me about Z80 emulation, pointed me to the right documentation, and so on. Ignacio tested my emulator against their own emulator to tell me which opcodes were not correctly emulated... to all THANKS A LOT.
All these people have their own Z80 or Spectrum emulator, look for them on any search engine:
Marat Fayzullin : z80 emulator (Z80 microprocessor). Raul Glez: R80 emulator (Spectrum). Philip Kendall: Fuse emulator (Spectrum). Ignacio Burguer: GLECK emulator (Spectrum). Z80user, Kak, Hylian, Kel: From #spectrum on IRC-Hispano.
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Gines Flores, for trying to help me on the emulator.
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Jose Manuel Claros, for the help on all the spectrum stuff.
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Pedro Gimeno, for creating his Spectrum emulator (and for the readme!).
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Grzegorz Adam Hankiewicz, for helping me on learning Allegro... and of course all the Allegro Development Team, for creating such a nice programming library. Read the allegro's AUTHORS file for all the people who has contributed to Shawn Hargreaves' initial Allegro.
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Aspectrum use AGUP library, see http://agup.sourceforge.net and the source code of Aspectrum for more information.
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Aspectrum use a modified libayemu, https://github.com/gasman/libayemu from Matt Westcott, that is derived from https://asashnov.github.io/libayemu.html of Sashnov Alexander
Santiago Romero AkA NoP/Compiler. [email protected]
